


The Ghost of Casterly Rock

by Bellatrix_Wannabe_89



Category: A Song of Ice and Fire & Related Fandoms, A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin, Game of Thrones (TV)
Genre: A Ghost Story, Alternate Universe - Ghost Hunters, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Brienne is a skeptic, But make it fluffy, F/M, Fluff and Humor, Ghost Sex, Jaime Is... You’ll See, Minor Hyle Hunt/Brienne of Tarth, Murder Mystery, Past Cersei Lannister/Jaime Lannister, Which is a tag I never thought I’d use
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-01-16
Updated: 2021-01-22
Packaged: 2021-03-13 19:54:51
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 4,964
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28783791
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Bellatrix_Wannabe_89/pseuds/Bellatrix_Wannabe_89
Summary: Brienne Tarth did not in any way, shape or form believe in ghosts, which makes it rather awkward considering her father is the most famous ghost hunter in the Stormlands and ran ‘Tarth Paranormal Investigations’ until he got sick and his skeptical daughter had to take over. Her first assignment? A large haunted mansion in the Westerlands called Casterly Rock. The subject? A malevolent golden haired spirit who haunts anyone who enters the Rock. Brienne doesn’t believe she’ll find anything of value. The green eyed man the Lannister family has staying in the home while she’s there however is quite insistent she’ll believe in ghosts by the time she leaves…
Relationships: Jaime Lannister/Brienne of Tarth
Comments: 14
Kudos: 64





	1. Chapter 1

Brienne hated flying. She hated feeling so out of control. Anything could happen up here hundreds of feet in the air. The cabin could depressurize, the engines could fail, a wing could crack… There were too many variables that could lead to disaster for her to feel comfortable in a seat she would always need to make herself as small as she could to sit in and mutter apologies to her seat mate who would mutter and glare at her as though her unusual form was something she could control.

She also hated ghost hunting, the supernatural, the paranormal, and anything out of the ordinary. Which was why she couldn’t begin to explain to herself why she was flying from Stormsend International to TLK Airport in Casterly to investigate the supposedly haunted Casterly Rock mansion.

It was all a joke to her. Irrational fears always had reasonable causes. Flickering lights were caused by faulty wiring and a bad bulb. Creaky door hinges just needed oiling. Faces in the shadows just needed a lamp to show that it was nothing more than a scarf overtop a rocking chair. 

Her father believed in it though. He always had. So much so that he started his own company. ‘Tarth Paranormal Investigations’ it was called, a waste of time and money in Brienne’s opinion. People whose imaginations frightened them would call up Selwyn, beg him to come down to their homes with his overpriced equipment, and confirm their fears that some supernatural entity was occupying the house with them so they could have an interesting story to tell their friends.

It made him a pretty penny, and people said he was good at his job. So good in fact that he was given grants to write books, money to lecture students, and was even paid to be interviewed for documentaries about the most haunted places in Westeros that still aired around Halloween ten years after it’s first broadcast.

When she was a girl Brienne thought he was just trying to make money. He was being paid to put on a show for the homeowners. He would jump and say something brushed against him, pretend static he caught on his recorder were words that only he could interpret, say a flicker on the screen of the security cameras were proof of spirits. But as she grew older she realized that no, he wasn’t making it up. Selwyn genuinely believed temperature fluctuations wasn’t just the result of a draft old house, and believed the Electromagnetic Field (EMF) readers actually worked and wasn’t just companies scamming him and other like minded believers with boxes where the numbers would climb up or down at random.

In school her classmates would make fun of her for her fathers occupation, in college her professors would barely hide her snickers when she told them her last name, and now when her own students when they asked if her father was THE Selwyn Tarth she had to choose between disparaging her fathers chosen career in order to appear the no-nonsense practical history teacher she was, or defending her last remaining family. 

Eventually Brienne would decided to lie and say ‘no relation’. It was a safe and practical middle ground where she didn’t have to insult him or pretend she shared the same beliefs. Brienne was happy and content to live her life for a while. She had a job she loved, it was in a city she adored, and she even for the first time in her life had a friend. Renly Baratheon, the head of the English department, didn’t care who her father was. He didn’t care that every Halloween she choose to sit at home and read a good book, he didn’t care that she was practical and serious because the years of a desire for normalcy and mocking hammered away any sense of imagination. 

So when Selwyn called her one day from St. Duncan’s hospital on Evenfall begging her to take on the assignment for his next book ‘The Haunts of the Westerlands’ she was less than pleased. Brienne knew how to use the equipment and instruments, she knew what the readings were recording-worthy and which ones to ignore, she knew how to put on the game for the owners and the cameras… But so did Hyle Hunt, her fathers assistant and Brienne’s tormenter since she was a teenager and he worked with Selwyn during the summer between classes. But Hyle was off investigating the Castamere Estate where a whole family was massacred some 150 years ago and its former residents, the Reynes, still inhabited the large home. Selwyn needed someone he trusted with the Casterly Rock Mansion, an infamous haunt for those interested in the paranormal and he already rented the manse for the weekend with no return on the deposit. 

The story of the night the infamous Jaime Lannister tried to kill his two nephews and niece before his sister Cersei had to shoot him to stop the murders was well known even outside the supernatural circle. The wealthiest most beautiful family in Westeros wrecked with the scandal of an attempted murder of three children, stopped only by a woman protecting her children by killing her own brother? Her twin at that? Twins that had rather unsavory rumors surrounding them? It dominated every headline at the time and the apparent haunting of the mansion afterwards just added to the intrigue surrounding it.

Several movies were based on ‘The Rock’, both the attempted murder itself and the haunting of the mansion afterwards, usually with a much higher body count. It made it a popular haunting spot, with many amateur and professional ghost hunters staking out the home hoping to get a glimpse of the ghost, with many of them reporting glances of the spectre. The ghost of Casterly Rock was well documented but you couldn’t write a book about Westerland haunting without including it, and that was why Brienne, who hated flying and paranormal investigations, was flying to Casterly so she could lead a paranormal investigation.

When the plane came to a screeching stop on the tarmac it came with a phenomenal sense of relief, and she felt herself breathe for the first time since takeoff. After she collected her luggage, her clothes for the weekend and her ghost hunting equipment, Brienne hopped into her rented car and drove the short distance to Casterly Rock. It was an old large house, golden trim with red brick, at least five stories, with a wrap around porch that encircled the entire manse and a slanted black tiled roof that had seen better days. The yard was well maintained but dead trees stood tall, and reached out with bare gnarled branches, to make it more attractive to those like Brienne’s father and to give the tv crews that filmed there less prep work she figured. A wrought iron gate stood between two tall brick monuments, the stones and mortar cracked and crumbling. 

Brienne drove up the gravel driveway and parking as close to the door as she could get so she could unload her equipment. It really was a beautiful house, she had to admit. There was an old world charm to it, and she could see why legends of ghosts and bumps in the night were so prevalent here. If ever there was such a thing as a perfect haunted house, Casterly Rock would be it.

She grabbed the hard case of equipment and her own luggage and dragged it up the concrete steps, raising her brow at the two golden lions that stood guard on either side. Photographers and videos always made the ruby eyes glow a deep bloody crimson in pictures and made the paint cracked and decrepit, but in reality the rubies were rather lackluster after years of not seeing a bottle of polish and the golden paint was, more or less, well intact.

Brienne found the key under the map just like the groundskeeper said it would be, and when she stepped inside the door creaked loudly. _Of course it would_ , she thought as she shut it behind her. _How can you sell a haunted house without unoiled_ _doors?_

The carpets were all red with golden fringe, and the rooms were large and spacious with old fashioned crimson and gold furniture and a large grandfather clock ticked away loudly in the corner. 

Everything was designed to frighten those that entered the house, everything was made to sell an illusion to gullible people, and Brienne rolled her eyes at the sheer absurdity of it all. Why were there no haunted houses in modern bright homes? Didn’t tragedies happen in suburbia as well? But then again you couldn’t sell tours at Halloween and take deposits from paranormal Investigators at some cookie cutter box house in Highgarden. 

Brienne had half a mind to just go to a hotel for the weekend and fudge the numbers but her father was depending on her to give him accurate readings. This would be the highlight of his book and she could not let him down. So with that in mind she dragged her equipment into the living room and then carried her own luggage up to one of the multiple bedrooms. She chose the ‘Tommen Room’, the bedroom of the youngest boy, the one who had run into his uncle's (and possibly father if unsavory rumors were to be believed) room and saw him and his mother struggling with the gun after it went off. 

It was him crying out that gave Cersei the chance to fire the shot that killed the would be murderer, and it was Tommen that raced down to tell the night staff what had happened. The bed frame and mattress was newer, but it was still designed with the ‘haunted house’ theme well in mind. It was a four corner bed with heavy black drapes and dark bedding, with old fashioned wooden light-weight shingles that would bang if the window was cracked open even half an inch. 

After she made sure the windows were locked and sealed tight she made her way back down the long winding stairs and into the kitchen where the groundskeeper promised there would be food and water waiting for her. Brienne froze when she walked into the small kitchen that looked like it hadn’t seen an update from the seventies when she saw a man sitting at the table, tapping his fingers on the tabletop with a rather bored expression on his face.

He was rather handsome. Quite handsome, in fact. His jawline was sharp, his hair was golden curls and his eyes were the brightest color of green she ever saw. He was dressed rather casually with black slacks and a white button down that had the sleeves rolled up revealing two very well toned arms, and the first two buttons were undone giving him a rather arrogant pretentious air. If that hadn’t done it the way he glanced at her then turned away as though she wasn’t worth his time absolutely did.

“Are you the caretaker?” she asked and he immediately turned back to her, eyes wide.

“Excuse me?” 

“Are you the caretaker?” He didn’t look much like what a groundsman of these old houses normally looked like. Usually they were part of the decorum as well; old men with knowing eyes who always appeared to know some kind of foul secret, but there were all kinds of kinds she supposed. She walked over to him and held out her hand. “I’m Brienne Tarth, Selwyn Tarths daughter. I work for Tarth Paranormal Investigations.”

The man looked around the room and then back to her, apparently baffled at the interaction. “I’m… I’m sorry, are you talking to me?”

Brienne huffed and withdrew her hand. She crossed her arms over her meager chest. “I’m not in the mood for games, Sir. I just had a very long flight, I have a lot of equipment to set up and I am tired. Are you the groundskeeper or not? Did you rent the house this weekend as well? They told me I was the only one.”

“No, no, I uh…” The man stood up from his seat, looking almost nervous. He was tall, only standing an inch or so shorter than Brienne. “I’m sorry, I was rather spaced out there for a moment. My name’s Jaime Lannister.”

“Lannister?” She raised a brow at him. “You’re a member of the family who owns the house?”

He smiled. “I am, yes.”

“I didn’t realize anyone still lived here.”

“I assure you no one lives here,” Jaime said with a chuckle. “When we have visitors the family likes to have someone stay over as well, just to make sure everything’s on the up and up.”

“Understandable. Your family has a very beautiful home, Mr. Lannister.”

“Thank you. It’s such a shame about the hauntings though.” She rolled her eyes and he quirked his head. “What?”

“I’m sorry, I just don’t necessarily believe in ghosts.”

Jaime threw his head back and laughed. Brienne glared at him, her already low tolerance of him dwindling quickly. “I’m the one who doesn’t believe spirits walk around in sheets clanking chains and you think I’m the one worthy of mockery?”

“Yes I do actually,” he said with a smirk. “Why are you working for a paranormal investigator if you don’t believe in ghosts?”

“I do not work for a ghost hunter, Mr. Lannister, I am an educator. The only reason I’m here is because I know how to read the numbers the equipment gives out. If my father wasn’t ill he would have come himself.”

“I’m sorry about your father, but come on…” he smiled at her again and her heart beat harder against her chest. He really was quite handsome. “You gotta believe in ghosts just a little.”

“I believe in rational explanations, logic and overactive imaginations.”

“Well, Ms. Tarth, I do believe in ghosts. Very much so, actually.” Jaime’s smile showed a flash of dangerous bright white teeth. “And I guarantee by the end of your weekend here, you will as well…”


	2. Chapter 2

“Where are you from?”

“Tarth.”

“How long have you been a teacher?”

“Six years.”

“What do you teach?”

“History.”

“Do you have any brothers or sisters?”

Brienne sighed as she looked up from the instrument she was turning on, fighting against shooting glare at the over eager man sitting on the couch. “Do you often talk this much to the guests?”

“Oh no, I hardly talk at all.” Jaime smiled as though his answer was some grand joke. “Except to you.”

Brienne didn’t even offer a response to that. She merely rolled her eyes and turned back to the machine. She enjoyed a half a minute of silence before he was speaking again. “So you really don’t believe in ghosts?”

“No,” she said firmly as she finally hooked up the battery to the EMF machine. “As I said, I believe in rational explanations and logic. I do not believe there are people out there whose sole purpose on this earth is to frighten people with jump scares and creaky doors after they’ve died.”

Jaime shrugged. “Maybe ghosts are just looking for some contact and jump scares and creaky doors are the only way they know how to get attention. I imagine it’s quite lonely not being able to talk to anyone, not being able to leave the place where your death took place and you can’t even remember the day you died or the reasonings behind it.”

He sounded sad. Quite sad actually, and Brienne shook her head. “I have quite enough pity for the living, I don’t need to spend it on the dead.”

He perked up slightly. “Oh come on, I think the dead could use a little bit of pity, babe.”

“My name is Brienne, Mr. Lannister,” she answered sharply. “Not ‘babe’.”

“Nah.” He smiled and her heart went fluttering and she quickly turned back to the machine. “Babe suits you.”

She rolled her eyes again and leaned back as she flipped on the machine. 

On a normal day what would happen with the EMF is the numbers on the display would fluctuate between one and fifteen, and four out of the five led lights would be on red while one would be green. At most three lights lit up and readings of up to thirty five, forty would be recorded. 

The highest numbers Brienne ever saw was a ‘vacation’ she and her father took to Harrenhal, a dark old home with a long legacy of horror. Four of the five lights were green and the numbers reached a mind blowing 64, something Selwyn eagerly noted he’d never seen before. That place was the only place Brienne ever felt really might have been haunted. Her nightmares that night were full of a dark haired man forcing himself on her while she wore a strange ugly pink gown, and when she resisted he had several men in armor throw her into a deep sandy pit with something big, and evil. She woke up in a cold sweat and told herself over and over it was just a dream, that ghosts and spirits weren’t real. Even still the lights stayed on the whole night and when Selwyn asked her to come back with him months later she firmly declined.

Brienne expected the same here, one green light and numbers floating between 1-15. Instead all five lit up with a bright blinding, and the dial read an impressive 83, numbers she or her father had never seen before.

“Great,” she muttered with a frown as she tapped on the display. “It’s broken.”

“That or it’s picking up a lot of ghostly activity,” Jaime smirked. 

“It probably got banged around on the flight.” Brienne turned it off then back on once, twice, three times and each time the same numbers reappeared and the same five lights lit up in green. She groaned but nevertheless grabbed her notepad and wrote down the numbers, taking a picture on her phone for good measure. “He’s going to think I’m lying but the numbers are right there. Could you do me a favor and read off the numbers on that small yellow box right there?”

Jaime bent down over the digital thermometer. “65 degrees,” he said and Brienne wrote that down as well. “Is that normal or unprecedented?”

“Cold but normal. This is a large drafty house, it’s going to be rather chilly.” 

She grabbed the video recorder and climbed the ladder she put in the corner of the room, and Jaime looked up at it curiously. “What’s that?”

“It’s a run of the mill camcorder,” she answered as she began to mount it to the wall. “It catches flickering movements and lights that gullible people believe are spirits.”

“Well the spots on the camera have to mean _something_.”

“Yes it means faulty equipment and static.”

“You are quite the skeptic aren’t you?” Jaime laughed. “I doubt you’d believe a ghost even if you were to sit down and have a conversation with one.”

“If there were irrefutable evidence of ghosts, in the thousands of years Westeros has been here, we would know about it. We wouldn’t need to rely on spots on cameras and static on audio captures.” 

“Well when people say they’ve seen them, their families chuck them into the madhouse.”

“Maybe a hundred years ago but now they just cast them on a reality show on A&E or give them a grant to write a book.”

“Like they did your father?”

“Yes,” she huffed, turning on the camera before climbing down the ladder. “Like my father.” 

Brienne turned on her laptop and once she checked the camera was online she turned on own audio recorders. “Living room, audio capture day one,” she spoke into the microphone before she stood it up on the stand. 

“If you don’t believe in this stuff,” Jaime said as he sat down beside her. “Why bother hooking all this equipment up? Why not just lie?”

“Because lying is dishonest and dishonorable,” she said as she grabbed another box of equipment and headed upstairs. “I promised my father I would do it right.”

“Most people would just fudge the numbers and call it a day,” Jaime mused as he followed her up the stairs. “But you’re actually going to sit here all weekend and monitor that doohickey, record the numbers…”

“I made a promise to do this job so I’m going to do it.”

He smiled at her. “You are quite an original, Ms. Tarth. Not many people would have the honor that you have to do a job right if they didn’t believe in it.”

A warm blush painted her cheeks. “Thank you,” she muttered before she went into a large bedroom. It looked no different then the others, a large poster frame with black and crimson bedding. 

“Jaime Lannister’s bedroom,” Jaime said in a bored spooky voice. “The bedroom of the ghost.” 

Brienne furrowed her brow as she laid out the equipment on the bed. “Did your parents know the history of this place when they named you Jaime?” she asked, suddenly realizing why the name was so familiar to her. 

“Probably not,” he shrugged. “They’ve been gone a very long while so it’s not as if I could ask.”

Brienne turned to him, frowning. “I’m so sorry,” she said softly. “My mother, she died when I was very young also.” He offered his apologies as well and Brienne quickly hurried to set up the equipment to help alleviate some of the awkwardness. “Do you sleep on site?”

“I stay in the house during the night, yes,” he answered. “Normally in here actually.”

“Well why didn’t you tell me?” Brienne demanded, flipping on another EMF machine. “I wouldn’t have set up the equipment if I knew you slept in here.”

“It’s fine,” he smiled. “There’s plenty of rooms to stay here. Everyone always finds this room fascinating though I don’t know why.”

“It was his bedroom. If you were hoping to catch a glimpse of a ghost that’s probably where he would be.” 

Another flip of the machine, another abnormally high reading. She furrowed her brow as she tapped on the display. One machine being broken but two? In the exact same manner?

“Equipment giving you trouble?” Jaime asked suddenly very close to her ear. Brienne jumped and glared at him. 

“Don't sneak up on me,” she barked before turning back to the machine. “There has to be some sort of WiFi signal in the air that’s making the readings funny.”

“Yes,” Jaime sneered. “It’s the wiffy that’s causing it to read oddly.”

“WiFi,” she repeated as she began to mount a camera to the top of the bedpost, giving her a clear view of the room. “There’s always a logical explanation for equipment fluctuations.” She climbed down and grabbed another recorder. “Jaime Lannister bedroom, audio capture day one.”

After she recorded the numbers on the EMF and the temperature she was done in there, and made her way down the hall to the last room. Jaime looked rather reluctant this time.

“Don't you wanna come in?” she asked as she stood outside the biggest bedroom, the one that had belonged to Cersei.

“No,” he muttered, looking down at the ground. “I don’t like that room.”

“Why? You can’t tell me you’re afraid.”

He glared at her, and his voice was angry now, no longer teasing. She shuddered as though a cold front hit her. “I didn’t know I needed a reason for not following you inside my own house.”

“You don’t,” she shot back before she pushed open the door and walked in, head held high.

The carpet was a blood red crimson, the bloodstain long since washed out of the floor, and the bed was large and soft with red and gold bedding. A painting of a stern blonde haired green eyed man hung on the wall, Tywin Lannister, the father to the twins, with a placard beside it reminding people not to touch. 

Brienne shivered from the icy chill in the room. It was nothing more than the wind, she told herself as she closed the window. She wrapped her arms around herself as she surveyed the room, telling herself with a firm inner voice there was nothing to be afraid of.

Everything was untouched from that night. Her hairbrush she was using when he came into the room was still on her vanity with long golden hair in the bristles and the silver candlestick that they knocked over in the struggle was on the ground, a black burn mark on the floor where the tiny flame caught the carpet on fire. A rocking chair stood in the corner of the room, and Brienne raised her brow at the obviously new furniture that the groundskeeper had put there, the only thing without a placard asking people not to touch. 

A young woman wouldn’t need a rocking chair in her room, and Brienne bet if she went and investigated further she would find weights attached to the bottom that made it rock back and forth. But even still, there was a dark heaviness in her room that even her rational mind couldn't explain away. She set up the equipment as fast as she could, swallowing hard when the numbers jumped to an astounding 93 and all five lights lit up as soon as she flipped the switch.

The WiFi _,_ she reminded herself as she recorded the numbers. It was just the WiFi. The temperature was low, but that could be explained away from the window being opened before she came in, probably for this exact reason. She set up the cameras and the audio and hurried out of the room, shutting the door behind her. 

It was fine. She was just spooked, that was all. A murder HAD happened there. A man DID plan to slaughter his family in that room, and if it had not been for a mother’s love he would have succeeded. There were even some who believed that Jaime had manipulated and forced his poor sister into a relationship she never wanted, abusing and violating Cersei since they were children. Even to someone as practical as her that knowledge was a little unnerving.

Brienne breathed easier when she was downstairs again, and she found Jaime sitting there on the couch, looking much happier now then when he was upstairs. 

“Get everything hooked up?” he asked as she grabbed ahold of her laptop.

“I did,” she said as she arranged the screen so all three video feeds were on one window and all three audio feeds were recording. “Now I just wait until dark before I make my rounds.”

“Why do you need to wait until dark?”

“Because according to my father, ghosts are more active when there’s a lack of sunlight. Something about the sun's energy disrupting theirs, but either way he likes to wait for dark until he begins his investigations.”

“That makes sense I suppose,” he mused. “I don’t put much stock in the theory though. The sun is further away than the moon. If the celestial _was_ gonna affect ghosts the moon would make them weaker, not the sun.”

Brienne shrugged. “Frankly I think it was just a theory that allows investigators to do their hunting at night and the customers are easier to spook.”

“Well you were just up there in that bedroom,” he said, shuddering slightly and Brienne rolled her eyes. “Do you think there was something there?”

“I think, Mr. Lannister, that your family owns a very large old house, with a horrible history,” she answered. “And it’s easy for people’s imagination, even imaginations belonging to practical minds, to get over excited.”

He was no longer smiling. “But you did feel something up there?”

“I felt unease, yes, but once again-.”

“Do you think you could figure out what happened?” he interrupted, desperately. “If there was a ghost here, if he was trapped in this house, do you think you could figure out the reason why?”

“Mr. Lannister-,” she sighed but he cut her off again. 

“You _could_ figure it out.” The readings on the temperature dropped, and the readings on the EFM ticked up. “That’s what you do, you investigate the reasons why people can’t move on.”

“I’m not here to find out why a ghost can’t move on,” she answered. “We know your ancestors' history, we know what happened here. Jaime Lannister tried to murder his family and his sister stopped him.”

He shook his head. “No,” Jaime muttered, leaning back against the couch. His eyes furrowed, as though he was confused, as though he was trying to pull up a long forgotten memory. “I know everyone thinks that but that’s not what happened… it couldn’t have...”

“The murder was investigated at length, Mr. Lannister. Cersei-.”

“I’m telling you, that’s not what happened!” he barked at her, and Brienne jumped as a bulb in the lamp beside him blew, a shower of sparks flying from the outlet. She swallowed hard as she put her hand to her breast, willing herself to calm down. Jaime looked rather shaken himself and he took a breath to calm himself. 

“I apologize,” he muttered. “I just… it’s family history. I can get a little intense about it.” Brienne nodded, saying nothing. Her heart was pounding hard in her chest. Jaime stood up from the couch and smoothed out his wrinkle free shirt. “I’ll let you get back to your work, Ms. Tarth.”

After he left Brienne sat back against the couch, staring at the broken lamp for a long, long while. Faulty wiring, she told herself firmly when she turned away. It was all just faulty wiring…


End file.
